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Monday, 28 April 2014

Next Monday I am due to be bringing you an excerpt of Haunting Mr Darcy: A Spirited Courtship by Karalynne Mackrory as the first stop on the blog tour, brought to you by Leatherbound Reviews.

Last year I read Ms Mackrory's Bluebells in the Mourning and I absolutely loved it. I've read over a hundred Austen-inspired books, and I would rate this in my top three variations. So I thought I'd share my review of it with you, which I wrote last year:

Bluebells in the Mourning

Here is a Pride and Prejudice variation for all you romantics! I really loved this book. We pick up the story with Elizabeth at the Hunsford Parsonage. She ducks out of dinner with Lady Catherine to read 2 letters from Jane that have just arrived (one had been misdirected, the address being written very ill indeed). Darcy arrives to propose, as in canon and finds Lizzy very distraught, having just found out that one of her sisters has had a fall from Oakham Mount and has died from her injuries.

Obviously, the proposal never happens and instead Darcy escorts Lizzy and Maria Lucas to London, where they stay for a night at his house (chaperoned by Georgiana and Mrs Annesley). Spending so much time with each other leads them both to make some re-evaluations - Darcy begins to see that he can be self-absorbed and selfish, and he realises from a hint Lizzy drops that not only has he made an error in removing Bingley from Jane but also that if he had have proposed he probably would have been rejected. Lizzy begins to see that she has been wrong in being so hasty to judge Mr Darcy, and also she starts to question to herself whether Wickham's story is true.

Now Lizzy is in mourning, Darcy wouldn't be able to make her an offer of marriage for at least 3 months, but what he instead tries to do is make up some of the lost ground caused by her initial poor impression of him. In this, he is joined by Georgiana, who does her best to matchmake.

Considering this book starts with a death, especially that of somebody so young, it's not a sad book at all. Although the characters mourn there are also positive effects of the death, most notably the relationship between Mr and Mrs Bennet, the latter of whom blames herself for her daughter's demise.

One of the things I particularly liked is the number of familiar lines from Pride and Prejudice which turn up, often spoken by somebody who didn't say them in P&P. This story is really sweet (but not over-sweet) and romantic and if you don't like any sex scenes then you are safe, nothing goes further than just a few kisses and the only time you get behind the bedroom door is a birth scene in the epilogue.

The only minus points to this book are a few of the words used. There are some American words, the odd word that is too recent, and a few instances of the wrong versions of word being used, but not enough to distract from a lovely romantic story that will leave you with a smile on your face. I would highly recommend this one!

Friday, 25 April 2014

This is a Christian historical romance, set in 1813. Rees
Phillips is working in London for the Home Office. He’s posing as Lady Wexham’s
butler under a pseudonym, trying to discover if she is a spy for
Napoleon. Lady Wexham is a young widow of a much older husband, who she married
at her mother’s behest. She is a French émigré and she is, in fact, spying for Napoleon. Her reason for supporting him is
partly that she sees Napoleon as a better leader for France’s future than the
alternative of restoring the royal family and partly because her life feels
quite empty.

Lady Wexham and Rees have a mutual attraction very early on.
Lady Wexham’s maid, Valentine, is suspicious of Rees and tells her employer.
Both Lady Wexham and Rees are hoping against hope that the other isn’t a spy,
but as time goes on each becomes convinced that their fears are true.

‘Why was there this
yearning in her heart for something genuine and honest from him?’

From Lady Wexham’s point of view, although she doesn’t view
Rees in the same way as she views her other servants, because she knows he
isn’t one, she has quite an egalitarian view of others, so that’s less of an
issue for her. However, if he finds out
the truth about her she could hang.

Rees is even more conflicted; he is tempted to put his
growing allegiance for Lady Wexham before his allegiance to his country and he
knows that she is very far above him socially.

‘The woman fascinated him
more than ever. What other highborn lady
would spend an hour talking with a servant? Was it because she was indeed a
French Republican, seeing no class difference between the two – or was it that
she knew he was no butler? More likely the latter.’

In addition to this, his faith is very important to him and
he is unsure of how virtuous Lady Wexham is - he knows that she doesn’t attend
church, but he doesn’t know whether she has taken lovers. This is not something
that Rees would be able to overlook.

As time goes on, Rees realises that Lady Wexham is in danger
from another source and his attempts to protect her brings them closer together. He comes to understand some of her political
views and she tries to reconcile her idea of the God that she feels abandoned
by with Rees’s view of a loving, guiding God. Both of them know that there
can’t be any future together...

‘They were enemies. Repeating the facts did
nothing to strengthen his commitment. It only filled his soul with a bleak
desolation as he watched her perform the steps of a minuet.’

I thought this was an interesting premise for a story, and
it highlighted parts of history that I was ignorant of previously, such as the
fact that there was a court of French royalists in Buckinghamshire. Obviously
since Rees was working as a butler his movements would be constrained by the
demands and the limits of acting in that role, but I felt that the author
worked hard to make any deviations from the role of the butler as plausible as
possible, such as Rees accompanying Lady Wexham on her visit to Hartwell House,
which you wouldn’t expect a butler to do.

I loved the romance between Lady Wexham and Rees. It was so restrained because of all the
barriers between them, neither of them is even sure that the romance isn’t just
one-sided, so it’s all glances and internal emotions, which was wonderful.

‘Perhaps the only
words that could be communicated to each other were to be silent ones.’

This is a Christian book, which you wouldn’t really notice
for a while. I am new to reading Christian fiction but I am not sure how well
Rees’s faith fitted with the job he was doing and although this is mentioned I
felt he seemed a bit blasé about this conflict, which in some respects didn’t
fit with his character when you consider how he angsted about how good a
Christian Lady Wexham was. Rees asked God for guidance and support more and
more as the story progressed, and so the Christian aspect of the story
increased as time went on.

The only real issue I had with this book was that to me, it
felt more modern than the period. Things
like the language used – not just individual words that were out of place, but
the feel and flow of the sentences felt distinctly too modern to me. Also, some of the behaviour I am not sure was
in keeping with the times, such as the familiarity between Jessamine and Rees,
the fact that he was writing to her to me implies a commitment towards her that
doesn’t seem to be the case. I also felt
that the pacing of the storytelling really sped up at the end and it seemed a
little rushed to me, and there were obstacles to overcome at the end which added little to the story while some real obstacles were glossed over. However, I enjoyed
this book and I’d recommend it.

Tuesday, 22 April 2014

This is the first of the books about the Archer brothers, a
Christian book set in Texas in the 1880s.
I’d read book 2, Stealing the Preacher, and loved it, so I picked up
Short Straw Bride, which introduces the four Archer brothers, Travis, Crockett
(who is the hero of Stealing the Preacher), Jim and Neill. These four have a
very sad backstory – their mother died from childbed fever after having Neill,
and their father continued to raise them for a few years before he died after
falling from his horse. On his deathbed
he extracted a promise from the eldest boy Travis, then just 15 years old, that
he would protect his brothers and stay on Archer land. Mr Archer’s fears for
his boys were just ones, as they were sitting on some prime land and were
therefore vulnerable to attack or conmen. Travis followed this promise and the
Archer brothers soon had the reputation of being wild and unfriendly to
visitors, scaring off do-gooders who wanted to take in the orphan boys as well
as people with less altruistic motives.

The only time Travis has left Archer land in the intervening
years was the day that 10 year old Meredith Hayes trespassed onto their land to
retrieve her lunch pail, which a bully had thrown there. Her leg got caught in
a trap that Travis had set to deter trespassers, believing that they wouldn’t
truly hurt anybody. Travis frees Meredith from the trap and takes her safely
home. Following this interlude Meredith is about the only person who thinks
well of the Archers, and she has a particular soft spot for Travis, making him
the hero of her dreams.

12 years after the incident with the trap, Meredith is being
pressured to accept an offer of marriage from Roy Wheeler, a business associate
of her uncle, which will see her family’s land signed over to him. Walking out
with Roy, Meredith overhears a plan to burn down the Archers’ barn, containing
all their winter stores, to force them to sell their land to Roy. She tries to
warn the Sherriff’s office and isn’t believed, so she heads out to the Archers’
land to warn them of what is coming. Unfortunately for Meri, she ends up being
there as the attack happens, and winds up with concussion, which leads to her
having to stay at the Archers’ home. Her uncle is outraged at her loss of
reputation and demands that one of the Archer brothers does the honourable
thing and marry his niece. Meredith has the indignity of walking in on the
brothers drawing straws for who will marry her but the scene isn’t quite how
she sees it...

Choosing marriage to Travis over the alternative of moving
away, Meredith is faced with a situation she hadn’t anticipated – she can marry
the man of her dreams, but he’d be doing it for duty rather than love. However,
Travis feels more for her than she knows – he sees her good qualities, her
kindness, her bravery, but he feels that she has drawn the short straw in being
forced to marry, so he sets about courting his bride. The time following their
wedding reminded me a bit of the film Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, with
Meredith taking over the chores from her new brothers. Meredith was a very
likeable heroine, brave, hardworking, kind. She had been left with lasting
consequences to her leg from the incident with the trap so it was interesting
to see people’s attitudes towards her and you could see that it had affected
her self-esteem somewhat. Meredith tries to make the best of her situation –
she has a husband to encourage, as best she can, family issues are falling into
her lap and all the meantime she tries
to do God’s work for the family, which she believes is encouraging them
to open their hearts and their gates to welcome in their neighbours – they are
no longer the unprotected young boys that they were when their father died, but
grown men who have no need to hide, and should be able to feel free to follow
their callings in life.

I loved this introduction to the Archer clan! They were
wonderfully close and each contributed willingly to help the upkeep of the home,
taking on the roles of doctor/preacher, cook, launderer etc, and they were
fiercely protective of each other, but still teased each other like brothers
would. I couldn’t help but feel for Travis, who’d been carrying a burden of
guilt for his father’s death in addition to the huge responsibility of assuring
the protection and welfare of his younger brothers. The younger brothers, Jim, Crockett
and Neill, are less major characters in this book, but I was particularly fond
of Jim with his stoic silences.

Crockett has his own story, told in Stealing the Preacher and I noticed
that in May 2014 a novella is coming out containing Neill’s story, called Cowboy Unmatched (UK / US) which I’m sorely
tempted to get, despite the length of my to be read list! I believe Cowboy Unmatched is also available in the collection of short stories by various authors called A Match Made in Texas.

Saturday, 19 April 2014

Last year I read a book by Noelle Adams called Married by Christmas and I noticed that
the follow up book A Baby for Easter
was out.The first book deals with
Daniel and Jessica, and the second book (which could be read as a stand alone)
tells the story of Daniel’s brother Micah and Alice. A Baby for Easter is at a
reduced price at the moment, but you’d need to be quick, as I think it’s only
on sale for the next day or two. Here are my thoughts on both books.

A Baby for Easter

Alice has been through a hard time; her fiancé has broken up
with her, and he’s not the first fiancé to do so. Plus she has lost her job through cutbacks,
so she’s had to return to her home town, Willow Park and move back in with her
parents. Alice is a librarian, but she’s
only been able to secure 10 hours a week working in the library, and has
supplemented her income by going to work to assist the town’s pastor Daniel
(from Married by Christmas) with some office work. Alice enjoys being home although
she can’t afford a place to rent in the town, and she’s not overly sad that her
engagement was called off but she feels disappointed with herself that she put
up with a relationship that was going nowhere for as long as she did. To prevent future heartbreak she has made
herself five rules to live by to prevent her getting hurt again. These rules
basically are intended to stop her getting her hopes up with another man unless
he’s made it crystal clear what his intentions are.

Unfortunately for Alice, the potential for heartbreak is
popping into the office all the time. Daniel’s brother, Micah and Alice had a
summertime romance as teenagers which ended when he went off to college without
a backward glance for her. Alice had felt a real connection with Micah and he’s
become the yardstick that other relationships are measured against. However, he doesn’t seem too pleased to see
her now, being markedly less friendly towards her than towards other people.

After leaving town to go to college Micah’s life went off
the rails and he moved away from his religious beliefs and towards a life of
excess with lots of partying and one night stands. For the past year or so he’s been working
hard to get back on track, acting as a deacon for the church. However, his past
catches up with him when he has a baby foisted on him which he is told is the
result of one of his one-night stands.
The baby’s mother has died in a car accident and Micah had no idea that
he had fathered a child but now he’ll have to decide what to do about the
situation, pending paternity tests etc. Alice minds the baby for him while he
deals with some of the initial practical issues, and they come up with a
temporary solution – Micah’s house has an apartment above the garage which
Alice will live in rent-free in return for helping him out with the baby while
he has to work. This means that Alice
and Micah have to spend a lot more time together, with all the potential for
heartbreak that could bring, particularly as Micah has shown no compunction in
breaking Alice’s heart in the past.

I thought this was an enjoyable escapist read and I read the
whole book in one go. Alice was a
likeable heroine, but she had pretty poor self-esteem due to her poor
judgements in the past. Add this to rule
1 (never assume a man likes you unless he both tells you and shows you) means
that she misses all signs that Micah has feelings for her and she shows him
zero encouragement for a long time. Micah was a bit more complicated, having
been through a self-imposed crisis – he didn’t feel worthy compared to the rest
of the family so he behaved in a way that made him feel even less worthy and
got into a vicious circle. This in itself wasn’t hard to forgive, but he didn’t
seem that worried about breaking Alice’s heart again, which was a bit selfish,
made you want to give him a good shake! I liked the dynamic that the baby
brought to their relationship and some of the times the romance was
realistically reduced by the baby – hero with baby poo on his shirt for example!
The flipside of this was that it allowed us to see Micah’s tenderness as he
fell in love with his baby. I would have liked to have seen a bit more of that
tenderness directed towards Alice though, would have been good to have seen him
have to work a bit harder for her.

This is a follow-on from Married for Christmas, but it reads
fine as a stand alone. It was good to
see Daniel and Jessica from the first book, and it made me smile that she was
still having cooking difficulties, as this was something she struggled with.
Although both books have religious themes, in a way I felt this one felt more
strongly Christian though it doesn’t hit you over the head with it. The idea
that God doesn’t give us things because we deserve them but because he loves us
is an idea that Micah has to be reminded of.
There are no sex scenes in this book, if that is something you prefer to
avoid, but there is a scene that veers into intimate territory before it comes
back out of it.

Married for Christmas

Jessica has a proposition for her old friend Daniel. He's a
widower, having lost his wife, Lila, in a car accident. Daniel is a pastor, and
has the chance to become the pastor in he and Jess's home town but they'd
prefer somebody either settled down, or a bit older than Daniel. Jessica feels
very alone; she has friends, but not much in the way of family aside from her
mother who is in a nursing home. Jess works from home so doesn't even have work
colleagues. Jess has given up in the idea of love and romance, but she'd like a
family. Feeling that she and Daniel could both benefit from a marriage, Jess
proposes that they get married, which would improve his chances of getting the
church he wants while giving Jess a chance of having the family she craves. Of course,
Jess's choice of husband may have been influenced by the fact that she has some
pretty strong feelings for Daniel, but she knows that he hasn't really let
himself move on from losing his wife. Still, she has given up on waiting for Mr
Right, and feels she can be happy in a marriage with Daniel, knowing that he'll
never love her in the way he loved Lila.

This was something a bit new for me, in that Daniel is a
pastor, and Jess is a committed Christian too, so I wasn't sure if the story
would have religious tones to it. Although religion does affect their behaviour
to some extent, for example not having sex before marriage etc, it's a romance,
and there are a number of sex scenes, which you might not be expecting. Both
main characters go through a journey of sorts, coming to understand themselves
better. Daniel particularly had a lot of stubbornness and guilt to overcome.

The only thing which I would have liked to change about this
story was the timeframe. I felt that Jess was pretty impatient with Daniel,
considering she'd thought through the implications of the type of marriage they
had, and it made her a tad unsympathetic, although she was redeemed by her
attempts to live up to the standards she felt were acceptable for a pastor's
wife, including her disastrous cooking! I enjoyed this story, and it had a nice
touch of Christmas feel-good about it.

*Disclaimer - I received an e-arc of this book from the
author for my honest review.

Tuesday, 15 April 2014

This is a variation on Pride and Prejudice in two books –
the first explores a less happy outcome, which Elizabeth dreams prior to
Darcy’s proposal at Hunsford, and the second book looks at what could have
happened if she’d prudently accepted his proposal and so doesn’t give him the
vehement response that changed his behaviour.

To make sense of this book I think it’s important to
appreciate something of the state of affairs in the Bennet finances – Mr
Bennet’s estate was entailed on Mr Collins. In the event of his death pretty
much everything Mr Bennet owned would revert to Collins, and he could evict the
Bennet ladies. Mrs Bennet would have a
minuscule income and would probably have to rely on family such as the
Gardiners and the Phillips family to support her and her daughters. The girls
could potentially find genteel work but their options were very limited. Jane, Elizabeth
and possibly Mary could perhaps have found jobs as governesses, but the younger
girls had a poorer education. Ladies could become a paid companion (such as Mrs
Jenkins, Anne de Bourgh’s companion) but I think these tended to be widows
rather than maidens.

The only way to secure the future of the family after Mr
Bennet’s death is for his daughters to marry, preferably all of them, but if just
one of them married a man who was rich it would secure the future of all the
sisters. Yet, in Pride and Prejudice
Elizabeth spurns not one, but two advantageous
proposals. A modern reader can understand and sympathise as to why she does
this – she has no respect for Collins and actively dislikes Darcy, but I wonder
what somebody reading Pride and Prejudice when it was first published would
have thought. Would they have thought
Elizabeth was selfish to have put her own happiness ahead of her family’s
security? When Elizabeth tells Jane that she has rejected Darcy’s proposal she
asks Jane “You do not blame me, however, for refusing him?” so Elizabeth is
certainly aware of the difference it could have made. She doesn’t seem to feel the same about
Collins’ proposal, but that was nowhere near as good a match.

In Book One, C P Odom explores what could have been the
consequences of Elizabeth turning down Darcy’s proposal if she’d never met him
at Pemberley. Here, Elizabeth gives the scathing refusal that she gives in
canon, and events follow the path of Pride and Prejudice until Elizabeth and
the Gardiners go to visit Pemberley. Darcy’s horse gets a stone stuck in his
hoof, meaning that Darcy arrives later to Pemberley than in Pride and
Prejudice, so he doesn’t see Elizabeth. This in turn means that there is no
follow up visit to Pemberley, and obviously when Elizabeth gets the letter
telling her that Lydia has eloped Darcy is not there to tell, meaning that
Lydia is not found in time to prevent lasting damage being done to her sisters’
reputation, leading to them being shunned by Hertfordshire society. This is how
bad things get, look at this quote from poor Jane:

“I cannot deceive
myself any longer that everyone is good – I have become aware there is indeed
evil in the world.”

The story follows on for the next forty or so years, showing
what Elizabeth’s life could have become. Obviously, this is not the happiest of
stories, but I thought it was an interesting exercise in exploring what could
have been. Much of the book deals with happenings that are in Pride and
Prejudice anyway, so it doesn’t really start feeling sad until they miss each
other at Pemberley. I felt it wasn’t too far-fetched or unkind, although the
fate of the Bennets could have been happier. I thought Elizabeth faced
adversity courageously and with good humour.

Book Two sees Elizabeth waking from her dream. She doesn’t
remember the details, only a vague recollection of some things, but she knows
it was a bad dream. Charlotte Collins suspects that Mr Darcy is interested in Elizabeth,
and, being a prudent person, she sees all the advantages of it. She works on
Lizzy to extract a promise that if he were to propose that Lizzy won’t dismiss
it out of hand. She has some interesting arguments in regard to Darcy’s
behaviour in Hertfordshire, and his likely reasoning for interfering with Jane
and Bingley. Charlotte is so persuasive that when Darcy proposes to Elizabeth,
although he makes offensive comments regarding her family, she manages to bite
back the words of her retort and asks for time to consider.

When she does, she can’t help but think of all the financial
advantages her family would receive from the marriage – lifetime security for
her mother and her four sisters, and the probability that Jane and Bingley will
cross paths again, thus securing the happiness of Elizabeth’s most beloved
sister. Lizzy wryly tells Charlotte “It is truly distressing to have such
sensible arguments occur to me when I want to ignore them”.

The thing that swings the balance towards
accepting Darcy is her vague recollection of the dream, that it could be a
terrible mistake to reject him. Elizabeth has also begun to wonder whether
she’s judged his character correctly; she’s obviously massively misjudged his
feelings towards her at the very least. After considering, Elizabeth decides to
act prudently and accept the proposal, politely making it clear that since she
is only just aware of his interest she cannot pretend to have the same level of
feelings for him that he’s expressed to her.

At first, I wasn’t very keen on this calculating portrayal
of Lizzy who sees Darcy as a bit of an improvement project:

“Perhaps she, in time,
could soften the harshness of his pride and arrogance. It would need slow, careful work; his
character had been formed over the years, and modifications could not be
accomplished overnight. In the meantime, it was essential she not damage his
regard for her, for his affection would be the motivation to induce him to
change his manner, if such were actually possible.”

In this view I am joined by Jane, who calls Lizzy out on her
obstinate view of Mr Darcy as an unpleasant man:

“I would only ask you
respond to him in a more kindly and less calculating fashion than was indicated
in your letter.”

Go Jane! From Jane Bennet, this is the equivalent of what
would be strong disapprobation from anybody else. Luckily, Lizzy makes a
conscious effort to improve her attitude, and finds many good sides to Darcy
that she never suspected. The Gardiners love him, she finds that he has a sense
of humour, and she cannot fail to appreciate his loving behaviour toward his
sister.

I felt a bit sorry for Darcy in this book (as opposed to the
first book where I felt very sorry for them both!) because he realises that
Lizzy has accepted him solely for prudent motives, and that she finds him
lacking. He has a number of moments when
he realises times when he has not done himself justice in her eyes, such as in
his behaviour in Hertfordshire, and when he finally hears the lies that Wickham
has told about him he then finds out that Lizzy believed him capable of such
behaviour. I am pleased to report that there is a lovely happy ending to this
book, but it was a little sudden. I felt
the book could have done with a few chapters after they finally had equal
feelings so I could revel in it a bit. I think the reader deserved to wallow a
bit in happiness at the end of this book to balance out the book overall.

One thing I particularly appreciated about this book was the
care taken with the language, as often these books have language that doesn’t
fit the setting. There were very few instances throughout the book that jumped
out at me, which was refreshing, although Mr Bennet says at one point that
Lydia won’t get a cent from him, this was a rare lapse! Since I knew it had quite a sad first book I
started it when I had time to read right through the first half and that
approach worked well for me! On the whole, I really enjoyed this book, and I’d
recommend it. I will only add, for the
benefit of those who prefer to avoid them, that there are no sex scenes.

Saturday, 12 April 2014

This is one of my favourite 'Pride and Prejudice' - inspired novels, and it's free tomorrow (13 April 2014) on kindle, along with some other Austenesque reads, as part of a Meryton Press promotion. So I thought that to persuade you that you should download it, I'd share with you my thoughts on this book:

1932 is a 'Pride and Prejudice'-inspired story set in the US in the early 30s. Dr Bennet, a college professor, has lost his job due to the university cutting staff. Having made no arrangements to safeguard his family's future and having lost money in the crash & depression the Bennets' home is going to be repossessed. Bennet goes to his brother in law in desperation. Luckily, Dr Gardiner has a solution; the Bennets can relocate to Meryton, where the Gardiner family farm is, and try to scape enough to live on.

On their arrival in Meryton, Lizzy first encounters Mr Darcy, a well-off farmer who she is sure disapproves of the whole Bennet clan. He lives with his sister Georgiana and her two small children. Lizzy goes to work for her uncle, who is a vet, and her path crosses again with Darcy when his animals need treatment. Jane gets a job working for Mr Bingley, a rich store owner who lives with his spinster aunts, Caroline and Louisa. Caroline is older than Mr Darcy (haha!), but still thinks she's in with a chance of becoming his wife, and she's just as sharp-tongued as in P&P.

The story loosely follows the plot of Pride and Prejudice but with one major variation. Lizzy's feelings towards Darcy start to soften, but they have distance between them, partly due to each of them being too proud, but also by secrets that both of them are keeping from each other.

One of the things I particularly enjoyed about 1932 is all the elements from P&P that are included. Aside from the characters, many of whom appear, we have a Netherfield ball, Hunsford, obnoxious proposal, and lots of dialogue that echoes dialogue from the original, added to a lovely romance. One word of warning though, is that there are a few sex scenes in this book, but nothing very explicit or pre-marital and one of them is notable for not romanticising things. If you read the book you'll know which one I'm referring to!

I'd really recommend this book, I absolutely loved it, and I've actually read it a few times now!

Tuesday, 8 April 2014

I’ve got a few reads lined up that I wanted to make sure that
I had plenty of reading time for so I’ve been putting off starting them,
meaning I’ve not read much the last few days. So, I thought I’d share with you
my thoughts on something I read last summer, Pirates and Prejudice by Kara
Louise.

This was such a fun variation on Pride and Prejudice! We pick
up with Darcy after his failed proposal at Hunsford. He has let himself go and
is wallowing in his misery; he's rented a room near the docks so nobody of his
acquaintance sees him in this state because his hair is a mess, he hasn't
shaved in ages, and he spends his days boozing to forget. He is almost
unrecognisable, and he gets mistaken for the pirate Lockerly.

Luckily, due to
the fact that Lockerly has a scar that Darcy doesn't, Darcy doesn't get hung as
a pirate but due to his uncanny resemblance to the pirate he is asked to pose
as him in hopes that the real Lockerly will be tempted out of hiding. Although
disguise of every sort is his abhorrence, Darcy is persuaded to comply,
dressing as Lockerly and learning some less gentlemanly lingo. He hopes that
having this deception to focus on will take his mind off the lovely Miss Bennet
that found him so lacking as a gentleman.

Unbeknown to him, the same Miss Elizabeth Bennet
is accompanying her father to visit his sister on the Isles of Scilly. On their
return trip their vessel gets into difficulties and the ladies get taken ashore
to an island but when the sailors try to get the men to shore they run into the
real pirates. Luckily, there is a fake Lockerly nearby who is on hand to
help....

What follows involves mistaken identity, sword
fighting, swashbuckling, rope swinging, pirate treasure, changed viewpoints and
some lovely, lovely romance. There are no sex scenes, which will please those
people who prefer to avoid them, and don’t think sex scenes would have added
anything, it’s wonderfully romantic as it is.

If you are looking for something that Jane Austen herself may
have written, then this probably isn't it; but if you are willing to have a bit
of fun with your Austenesque variations then I'd certainly recommend this one!
I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Saturday, 5 April 2014

This is a Pride and Prejudice ‘what if’ variation; what if
Mr Darcy mentioned Miss Elizabeth Bennet in his letters to his sister from
Netherfield and Georgiana came to Netherfield to provide him with support.
Thus, Elizabeth sees from very early on that Darcy is a different man to the
proud, unfeeling person she believes him to be when she witnesses his interactions
with Georgiana. Also, with Georgiana’s
encouragement Darcy doesn’t fight particularly hard to fight his attraction to
Elizabeth. She is still determined to
dislike him, but she feels unwillingly attracted to him.

When Wickham comes to Meryton it doesn’t take him long to
determine Darcy’s feelings for Elizabeth and he comes up with a plan that
backfires spectacularly for him, leading to Darcy being requested by Mr Bennet
to propose to Elizabeth. Darcy believes that Elizabeth is extremely unhappy to
be marrying him due to her dislike of him, when in fact, she is unhappy to be
marrying a man who she believes doesn’t care for her at all. Prior to the
marriage he makes her a promise that he won’t touch her unless she wishes it,
which of course puts her in a situation where she would have to be pretty bold
and forthright with him.. but why would she do that when she feels her husband
doesn’t care for her? And with this kind of distraction, could Wickham be
causing more trouble?

I had just come into this on the back of a few books that
didn’t entice me to read on and I am happy to say that my luck changed with
this book, it’s very readable, even if you want to shake the protagonists
sometimes! This is a fun, mostly light hearted story. There is no Mr Collins, and I found I could
cope with his absence quite happily! There is quite a bit of symbolism, with
Lizzy caring for some chickens at Pemberley who are hatching at the wrong time
of year. This author’s sister is also an
author of Austenesque stories, Karalynne Mackrory, and there is a very sweet
nod to her in the mention of a Miss Mackrory, whose name is similar to
Caroline.

Although I really enjoyed this book there were a few things
for me that didn’t ring true. Some of
the timeline was odd – such as I think the Netherfield Ball happened in
October, rather than November, then the marriage happened two weeks after that,
and around five or so weeks later Lizzy is barefoot in the stream and later
than this walking round without a coat on, and I couldn’t help but feel that it
would be too cold in North England for any of that. Also, the language had a distinctly American
tone to it on many occasions, such as Jane referring to her mother as ‘Momma’
and Mr Darcy wearing vest and pants rather than a waistcoat and breeches.

Some of the behaviour of Elizabeth and Darcy felt
uncharacteristic to me – Elizabeth scarcely meets her maid Serafina before she
is letting her into confidences, whereas in Pride and Prejudice Elizabeth is a
character who I think is pretty secretive, she is the sort to keep her own
counsel, and I couldn’t see her being so open with anybody, let alone a
servant, when she is trying to act in the manner of the mistress of Pemberley.
It also didn’t ring true to me how long it took Darcy to work out her symbolism.
She gives him some pretty clear clues, and he is described as ‘clever’ in Pride
and Prejudice. I can understand him
misinterpreting her feelings, but I think he would have worked it out fairly
quickly. Also, the day before Darcy sets
out to do something extremely important, he gets drunk because he is
embarrassed about something, which struck me as extremely unlikely, albeit
amusing, because he is so motivated by duty.
For these reasons, I wouldn’t recommend this for somebody who wants to
read a book in Austen’s style, but if I thought it was an entertaining,
romantic variation. It’s also worth
noting that there are no sex scenes in this book, if you prefer to avoid these.

Ms Ellsworth has written another book, ‘Pride and
Persistence’ which has a pretty unique premise of Mr Darcy suffering a head
injury which leads to memory loss at Hunsford and multiple marriage proposals,
and I definitely plan to read this one at some point.

Tuesday, 1 April 2014

Well March's reading was a mixed bag. I read quite a lot early on in the month, but towards the end I was struggling a bit, because I had a couple of books on the go that I'm not really getting on with. Firstly Sense and Sensibility by Joanna Trollope. I only just started it and I already don't like Marianne or the Mrs Dashwood character! The other book I am struggling with a bit is Fitzwilliam Darcy Such I Was by Carol Cromlin. This book is not bad but I'm finding it just a bit slow. I will try and persevere with these in April.

I also have a couple of books to review courtesy of the very kind Jakki at Leatherbound Reviews, which I'll shroud in mystery for now and tell you more about another time!

Aside from these my planned reading will be:

Mr Darcy's Promise by Jeanna Ellsworth - this is an historical variation, based on Pride and Prejudice. I don't know much more about this one. The cover of this book is so beautiful, though, makes me wish I had it hard copy!

Consequences by C P Odom, which I was lucky enough to win from So Little Time. This one looks like an angsty read. It's in two parts - part one is a worst case scenario of what could have happened to the Bennet family had Elizabeth not bumped into Mr Darcy in the grounds of Pemberley. This book is a bad dream, and I hear that it is a tear jerker. Thankfully Elizabeth wakes from this dream and finds herself in Hunsford prior to Mr Darcy's proposal, which she accepts as it's the sensible thing to do, but then she has a marriage which isn't based on affection. I have heard nothing but good reviews of this book, so I hope to enjoy it.

Short Straw Bride by Karen Witemeyer. This book is book 1 in the Archer Brothers series. I read (and LOVED) book 2, Stealing the Preacher last month and then this book went on sale, so it was fate that I read it.

I quite enjoy contemporary romance too, as long as it's not too fluffy. An author I usually enjoy is Noelle Adams, and I won a book of my choice from her email. The one I chose was called Playing the Playboy which is part two of The Heirs of Damon series. I wasn't massively fussed on part one, Seducing the Enemy, but that was because I didn't like the hero, and this one features a relation of his instead. I also picked up part three of this series, Engaging the Boss, because I have a huge weakness for fake fiance scenarios - I know they are unbelievable and often cheesy but I can't help enjoying them!

My last planned book for the month is The Tutor's Daughter by Julie Klassen, which is another historical, but I don't know much more than this.

About Me

I've loved reading for as long as I can remember. I usually read romance, both historical and contemporary but I'm not usually a big fan of chick-lit. My favourite author is Jane Austen, and I really enjoy reading stories inspired by her work. I also love many of the works of L M Montgomery, Georgette Heyer and Mrs Gaskell, amongst others.